The US is already the wealthiest country in the world.
To what time period is he referring to when he says "again". Nobody can tell me. Does he mean the 1950s Eisenhower when the top tax rate was 90 plus percent, a rate my Grandfather had to pay which only the one percent had to pay?
The citizens today are not wealthy, but the country is. Today the top 0.1% in U.S. have almost as much wealth as bottom 90%.
A man used to be able to work a factory job, have a 3 bedroom house, car in the garage and a wife at home cooking dinner as he supports his family on a single income. Today, that is not possible. Have any of you ever looked into why this is?
"Wealthiest"? Maybe...maybe not. But if freedom is wealth, if opportunity is wealth then you're damn right we are the wealthiest nation on the planet.
And in recorded history.
The "American Dream", if you will.
To my ears, what you are suggesting sounds like we should just give it away to those who have not earned it. This line of ignorance is what got banks into trouble because they had to lend to unqualified people for a home because it was somehow now a right. Same with cars. Why we bailed those companies out is beyond me. Nothing is too big to fail that is smart enough to regroup and come back stronger and I think GM and Chrysler would have done so or passed into history. Giving loans to people who were also unqualified was stupid and done in the name of political correctness. But this was done and is now history. Learn from the past so as not to repeat the ignorance and instead duplicate the successes.
No one owes anyone the "American Dream", it must be earned on an individual basis. Allow me to expand upon this further by stating without reservation that no one owes anyone an apology for slavery. No one owes anyone an apology for taking this land from the so-called (as they got here first) indigenous peoples. None of us has a "right" to be liked by everyone. We all have a right under American Laws to be treated as equals under the law but you cannot legislate either morality or what it means to be human, even when it sometimes results in people behaving as animals.
To be certain, there are things about the 50s that are with merit, just as there are about most any era in civilization. Civilization. Not barbarism. Some would say it is in our nature to behave as animals because we are in fact animals but we can be better.
As a dear friend taught me, we can choose to be better or bitter. The later causes us to simmer in the sorrow of our own making.
